Do sleeping birds fall off their perch?
Birds often fall asleep while standing on a tree branch or perch. Unlike monkeys, birds do not have a prehensile tail to hold onto the branch. So, why don’t they fall off?
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How long does the Koala sleep each day?
The Koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is an arboreal (tree-living) marsupial in the Phascolarctidae family, found in eastern and southern coastal Australia.
The Koala sleeps for 20-22 hours a day. A day is 24 hours, so a Koala sleeps for 83% to 92% of a day.
Why does the Koala need to sleep for so much time?
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In research conducted in 2020, scientists think that lions have contagious yawns – when one lion yawns, nearby lions yawn too. This is shown in human behaviour too. Also, scientists noticed that a lion’s yawn signals to other lions that it is time to get moving.
Scientist Elisabetta Palagi at the University of Pisa in Italy, and her research students, were collecting hyena data in South Africa. The New Scientist magazine in April 2021 reported that the researchers also filmed lion behaviour. Elisabetta Palagi noticed, when she watched the videos, that the African Lions (Panthera leo) were yawning one after the other and then got up and moved in near-synchroncity – that is, they all made similar movements.
Palagi’s research students, Grazia Casett and Andrea Paolo Nolfo, observed 19 lions living in two social groups at the Siyafunda Wildlife & Conservation Camp, which is a research camp in the Greater Makalali Private Game Reserve in Limpopo province in South Africa. They took about five hours of video for each African Lion, day and night, over four months in 2020.
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The hippopotamus can lie submerged in freshwater rivers or lakes for up to 16 hours a day.
The Hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius) has its small ears, small eyes, and large nose at the top of its head and can submerge itself underwater, with only these parts of its body showing above the water.
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What is the difference in the way a baboon and an orangutan sleep?
Scientists conducted a research study to see if there was a difference in the way large primates sleep.
American scientists, Dr. Samson of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina and Robert Shumaker of Indiana University in Bloomington, chose two primate species to study, and they published their findings in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology in 2015.
The primate species they chose to study were the baboon and the orangutan. The baboon is a monkey (it has a tail) and the orangutan is an ape (it does not have a tail).
They video-taped 12 baboons and 5 orangutans sleeping over a period of 1-4 months. The scientists studied their sleeping positions, body movements, sleep patterns, and brain activity by measuring rapid eye movement (REM) sleep (which is light sleep) and non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep (which is deep sleep associated with dreaming).
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The lark – a small diurnal songbird – rises early and is active during the day, whereas the owl – a large nocturnal bird – is active at night.
Psychology Today has documented a recent study on chronotypes – whether a person is a morning person (up with the lark) or a late night person (to bed with the owl) and who they attract as partners.
Many studies have been previously conducted on personality traits, but there has been limited studies on chronotypes. Chronotypical behaviour is a preference for rising early or going to bed late. Morning people are called larks (and they reach peak performance early in the day) and late night people are called owls (who perform well in the afternoon or evening).
However, there is a continuum, with most people clustering around the middle – a neutral chronotype.
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How do giraffes sit down?
Giraffes sit down by folding their legs underneath their bodies. Usually they fold their front legs, but they can sit with their back legs folded too.
Giraffes do not sit down for long periods because it is difficult to get up again, which puts them in danger of predators.
Giraffes usually sleep lying down. However, they can sleep standing up.
What is aestivation and hibernation?
Aestivation is animal dormancy, or sleep, similar to hibernation.
Hibernation is winter sleep. Animals who aestivate can sleep for several years.
What is a catnap?
A nap or a catnap is a short or a light sleep, lasting for as little as 4 seconds to 20-30 minutes.
Photographer: Martina Nicolls
What does to let sleeping dogs lie mean?
To let sleeping dogs lie means that you should not cause trouble, don’t upset anyone, or you should leave things alone. Let the situation remain the same, and don’t change it.